Where the Heart Lies
by hellogoodbye57
Summary: Follows Nothing's Ever Normal. You don't have to read the previous stories, but it helps. Case fic with MSR and family. The case itself will stand alone.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own anything, yada, yada

Dana Scully tiredly placed her four-month old daughter back in her crib and glanced at the digital clock in the nursery. 5:36. She had been up for nearly an hour, and she did not see a point in attempting to go back to sleep now since she would have to be awake again in another hour to prepare for work. Scully yawned widely and turned to walk out of the nursery. Although the babies had begun to sleep in longer stretches, she was still not receiving the full amount of sleep every night. But she had begun to grow accustomed to lack of sleep, numbing herself to its effects. She liked to believe that she could function just as well on three hours of sleep as she could on eight.

As she walked out of the nursery, she nearly ran into her partner, Fox Mulder, who was holding their second baby, Samantha (affectionately called Mancer or Mancy by her doting father—short for necromancer since he believed her loud wails could wake the dead. He had a penchant for choosing unusual nicknames). "Did you get her back to sleep?" he questioned. Scully nodded, stifling another yawn with her fist. "Go back and try to get a little more sleep," Mulder told her, kissing her forehead. "I'll take care of this one." Scully glanced down at the baby in his arms who was grinning happily, wide-awake. She reached for the fabric of her father's shirt.

"I don't know if I'll be able to get back to sleep before I have to wake up again."

"At least lay down for awhile."

"Okay. You sure you're okay with her?"

In answer, Mulder held the baby up in front of him so that she was facing Scully. "Tell Mommy to go get some rest," he instructed. Samantha made some unintelligible noises, and Scully smiled, taking her tiny hand and kissing it.

"Okay, Sweetie, I'm going," she promised. She kissed Mulder briefly on the lips before walking around them and into her and Mulder's bedroom. Mulder watched the door close behind her before turning back to his daughter who was now cuddled against his shoulder.

"We need to make sure Mommy takes better care of herself," he told the small baby. She stared up at him with clear blue eyes; oddly enough, she seemed to comprehend what her father was saying. "Come on, Mancy, let's go downstairs and see if we can find something to entertain ourselves."

The blaring of the alarm clock woke Scully an hour later. She blinked, surprised that she had actually managed to fall asleep. Glancing over, she noticed that Mulder was not beside her. The baby monitor was also missing, so she assumed he had taken it. Still not feeling completely rested, Scully rolled out of bed and stood, stretching. Her body had finally almost returned to the size it was before her pregnancy, so she was able to fit into her old clothes again, including the nightgown she now wore, one of her favorites. Scully hoped that she would be able to start running again in the mornings with Mulder soon so that she could shed the last few pounds she had gained from pregnancy.

Walking downstairs, she found Mulder sitting on the couch with Samantha on his lap, talking to her as he held various toys out in front of her. She grabbed at some of them, gripping them tighter than most babies her age could. Mulder had already noticed this and latched onto it as proof that she and her sister possessed above average intelligence. Scully was still skeptical of this assessment, but it was a nice thought. All parents wanted their children to be intelligent.

A plastic horse went into Samantha's mouth as soon as her father held it out to her, and she sucked happily on the toy. Mulder looked up at Scully who stood in the doorway watching them. "You want first shower?"

"You go ahead. I'll take her for a bit." Mulder nodded and stood, passing the baby to Scully as he left the room. She reached for her father for a moment before seeming to decide that her mother was an adequate substitute and cuddling against Scully. Scully held her close, loving the feel of the warm weight in her arms. She had always thought she would have to content herself with holding nieces and nephews since the doctor had told her she would be unable to have children of her own. Now, she relished every moment she spent holding one of her girls, even if those moments did sometimes come at 2:00 am when she was half-asleep.

Mulder returned fifteen minutes later with Melissa. Although awake, Melissa was not nearly as alert as her sister; she buried her face in her father's shoulder as he held her with one arm. He wore his slacks but had only an undershirt on, having learned the hard way that taking care of two babies while wearing a white dress shirt was asking for a disaster. Holding out his free arm, he accepted Samantha from Scully. As she was transferred from her mother to her father, Samantha dropped her toy, and she began to wail loudly. Bending over, Scully picked up the toy and handed it to the upset baby while Mulder attempted to calm her. Unhappy with her sister's distress, Melissa also began to whimper, and Scully reached to take one of them back. Mulder shook his head emphatically. "Go get ready for work. I've got them."

Scully nodded and left the room, casting a final look over her shoulder. Mulder had moved to the couch and seated himself with both babies on his lap, one arm looped around each of them to hold him in place as his hands found toys for them to play with. Samantha's cries were dwindling now, and Melissa had become enthralled by a set of colorful rings.

Mulder had started a pot of coffee, and Scully gratefully poured herself a glass when she came down. She fixed herself a bowl of cereal for breakfast and also placed one in front of Mulder who still had his hands full of babies. Scully took Melissa from his arms, and they both began to eat, having perfected the art of one-armed eating months before. As soon as they finished, Mulder cleared the dishes from the table while Scully fed Melissa. Now that the babies were older, they had fallen into a fairly regular feeding schedule, so Mulder and Scully had slowly developed a morning routine. Of course, the routine was going to drastically change that morning. Instead of Mulder going off to work by himself, Scully was coming with him for the first time in six months, for they had agreed that the babies were old enough now to stay with Scully's mother for the day.

Mulder finished cleaning up and played airplane with Samantha for a few minutes while Melissa finished feeding. He and Scully then switched babies, and he carried Melissa with him upstairs as he hunted for a clean shirt, jacket, and tie. Returning downstairs fully dressed, he placed Melissa in her bouncer and checked on Scully who was rebuttoning her blouse. As he lifted Samantha from her arms, the doorbell rang, and he walked out to answer it. "Hello, Maggie," he greeted when he saw her standing outside, wearing a light jacket to combat the slight chill of the October weather. "Come on in."

"Thank you, Fox." She stepped inside, and he closed the door behind her. Immediately, all her attention went to her grandchild. "Hello," she paused for a moment, studying the infant, "Samantha," she finally said. Like Mulder and Scully, Maggie could tell the twins apart though it often took her a bit longer. She held her arms out. "Let me take her. You and Dana need to get going."

"Thanks, Maggie." Mulder gratefully passed the infant to Maggie. Immediately, Samantha began to scream, reaching desperately for her father. Mulder looked torn for a moment, but Maggie shooed him away.

"We'll be fine," she told him. "She just needs to get used to me, that's all." And with that, she walked toward the living room, babbling nonsensically to the baby.

"Is Mom here?" Scully questioned, emerging from the kitchen. Mulder noticed that she was now in full FBI gear, from her dull gray business suit to the gun holstered at her hip. He smiled. It had been awhile since he had seen her in that particular outfit, and the familiarity of it was comforting.

"Yeah. She's in the living room with the girls."

"Okay. I'm just going to go say goodbye, and then I'll be ready to go."

"I'm right behind you." They walked together into the living room, Mulder knotting the tie which he had earlier slung loosely around his neck. After kissing both their daughters goodbye, they said a quick thanks to Maggie and left.

Scully entered the elevator feeling almost like an outsider. It had been so long since she was in the basement office; she wondered how much had changed since the last time she set foot in there. But as she opened the door to the office she had shared with Mulder for so many years, she realized her fears were unfounded. Nothing had changed. She should have known nothing would change. The office in front of her was still the same room that held so many memories for her—some fond and some not so fond. It was in that office that she and Mulder had first learned to respect and trust each other and had ultimately allowed themselves to love one another. It was their office, and no matter how long she was away from it, it would stay that way.

"Look at the door," Mulder said, coming up behind her. She jumped slightly; she had been so lost in her contemplation that she had not heard his approach. Slowly, she turned to the wooden door. Before, the only plaques on the door read "Special Agent" and, just beneath that one, "Fox Mulder." Now, another shinier, newer plaque hung under the first, one which read "Dana Scully, M.D." "I thought it would be a good homecoming present," Mulder remarked from behind her. She turned, impulsively leaning forward to kiss him despite the fact that they were at work and had earlier agreed to be nothing but professional while at work. Mulder did not seem to mind that they were breaking this particular rule, however; he eagerly kissed her back, wrapping his arms around her to pull her closer. Eventually, they broke apart, and he rested his forehead against hers.

"If I had known that would be your reaction, I would have gotten the plaque years ago," he joked. Scully laughed lightly before backing away from him.

"Come on, Mulder, we need to get to work."

"Oh, right , that. I've got a new case that I think you might find intriguing, Scully," he told her as he trailed her into their office.

"Let's hear it."

"Actually, I'd prefer to show it to you." He flipped off the lights, and Scully groaned. Still wearing his simultaneously infuriating and endearing grin, he crossed the room and turned on his favorite toy—the slide projector. A picture appeared on the small portion of the wall that he kept blank for this purpose. It showed a man in his late twenties with short, blond hair and a lean, muscular torso. He was lying on his back; Scully assumed he was dead though she could see no visible injuries. "Brett Morris, age 28," Mulder announced. "His body was found by a couple hikers yesterday about an hour and a half from here."

"What was the cause of death?" Scully asked.

"Ah, see that's the strange part. His heart was removed."

"Removed?" Scully looked closer at the picture, but she did not see any marks on the skin which would indicate the removal of his heart. "Through the back?" she asked.

"Not likely," Mulder answered, pushing a button on the remote to advance the picture. Scully saw that the image on the wall now showed the upper part of the man's back. Again, there were no marks on the skin.

"Maybe the killer cut into the skin and sewed it back together," Scully speculated. "If he was careful, he might be able to make it appear that he never made the incision."

"Maybe." Mulder's tone clearly indicated that he had a different theory.

"You don't think so," Scully guessed.

"Well, whatever happened, this wasn't the only time. This guy gets his kicks from killing couples. Brenda and Rick Hampton, killed two months ago. Greg Richards and Linda Laker killed just last week. And now, Brett Morris and his wife, Rachel." Mulder clicked the remote rapidly, showing pictures of the other five victims. "All the victims were found in the same forest, and all had their hearts removed though there were no signs of any incision. Local cops are stumped, so they asked for the help of the FBI. Since this case is unexplained, it got tossed to us."

"I can't really tell much from the photos," Scully said, squinting at the wall. "I'd really need to look at the bodies to know anything for sure."

"Ask and it shall be given to you," Mulder remarked. "The latest victims are waiting for you now at Quantico." Scully sighed, but in truth she was not frustrated. It was nice to fall back into their old routine. After months of not working, she was actually looking forward to doing an autopsy, returning to her familiar stomping ground.

Mulder drove to Quantico as Scully read over some of the details of the case. After about twenty minutes of silent studying, she finally spoke. "I think what we're dealing with here is a cult," she speculated.

"A cult?" Mulder's eyebrows shot up as he glanced over at Scully.

"Yes. There's some ritualistic elements to the murders. The taking of the heart, for example."

"Well, Dr. Scully, can you explain how this 'cult' managed to remove the victim's heart without leaving a mark of any kind?"

Scully frowned at the case file in her hand. "I will admit that is a bit odd," she said. Mulder opened his mouth triumphantly, but she continued before he could say anything. "However, I am sure there is a perfectly logical explanation for it. One which I will be able to find as soon as I can examine the bodies."

"Admit it, Scully, you're stumped."

"I'm not stumped. I just don't have enough information."

"There's autopsy reports from the first four victims in there. The coroners were not able to come up with any logical, _scientific _explanation for how the heart was removed. Face it, Scully, this can't be explained by science. It's paranormal."

"I don't think so, Mulder."

"Oh, come on, Scully, when have I been wrong?" Scully opened her mouth to say something, but Mulder cut her off. "Actually, don't answer that."

They debated the details of the case for the remainder of the trip, bouncing theories off each other. It was a routine they had established early on in their partnership, and one they easily fell back into. Working with Diana had not worked out for Mulder because she had accepted his theories too readily, had not forced him to consider the facts logically. With Diana, there had been no struggle, no challenge, and this lack of resistance had severely weakened Mulder's theories. But with Scully back at his side in her typical role as the skeptic, Mulder had all the challenge he needed. He had a brilliant mind to rival his own, a partner who complemented him. They made a good investigative team because of their differences.

When they reached Quantico, Mulder walked in with Scully. They stopped at the front desk to ask the location of the body; the tall, leggy brunette who sat there looked up at them, her smile full of false cheerfulness. "How can I help you?" she asked brightly.

"We were looking for the bodies of Brett and Rachel Morris," Scully explained. The woman gave her a cursory glance before turning her attention to Mulder. Her eyes traveled over his body, and her mouth formed into an appreciative smile. She leaned closer, and the strong smell of her flowery perfume enveloped both partners.

"Sure. Just let me look that up for you." Her voice dripped sugary sweetness, and Scully resisted the urge to roll her eyes. The woman typed something into her computer though Scully was unsure of how she managed to see what she was doing since her full attention was focused on Mulder the entire time. He seemed slightly bemused by the attention he was receiving though he tried valiantly to hide his grin from Scully. Of course, his efforts failed; she could see right through him.

"It's in Morgue four on the second floor," the receptionist finally announced.

"Thank you, Ms. . ."

"Coulter," the woman supplied.

"Coulter," Mulder finished. And then he flashed her his trademark grin, the one that no woman could resist (and Scully honestly could not blame them). Scully knew he was deliberately baiting her, playing a game of "let's see how much we can annoy Scully on her first day back." But Scully was above such petty games. She was not going to take the bait.

As they walked together to the morgue, Mulder sensed Scully's irritation. He had intended to provoke her by flirting with the receptionist, but he had meant it all jokingly. Had she misinterpreted his actions? Did she honestly believe he was capable of cheating on him? Did she not realize that no other woman could possibly compare to her in his mind?

Cursing himself for his stupidity, he placed a gentle hand on the small of her back, slightly hurt when she pulled away from the contact. "I'm sorry. I was just joking," Mulder assured her. "You've got nothing to be jealous of, I promise."

"I'm not jealous." Her reply was curt.

"I love you, Scully," he tried again.

"Mulder, this is not the time."

He grabbed her arm, stopping her mid-stride. "Scully, I really am sorry. I was honestly just playing around with you. You know I'd never cheat on you."

"I know, Mulder. Let's just go figure out what killed these women."

He followed her to the stairs. As they started to climb, he leaned in closer to her and whispered, "At least her name wasn't Bambi." Scully couldn't help it. She smiled.


	2. Chapter 2

As soon as they entered the morgue, Scully found a pair of latex gloves and a set of scrubs with threatened to swallow her whole. Ignoring this, she pulled them on quickly and approached the middle table on which one of the bodies lay. Mulder stood a few feet back, watching her enter what he had christened her "doctor mode"

Scully pulled a tape recorder out of her pocket and switched it on. After setting it on the small metal table, she began her narration. "The subject is Rachel Morris, age 26. Looks to be approximately 5'4" or 5'5" and around 130 pounds. Cause of death is not immediately apparent. No obvious gunshot or puncture wounds nor any scratches or other defensive wounds."

"Hey, Scully, I'm going to have a look at where they found the bodies. I should be back in about four hours. Call me if you need anything, okay?" Scully nodded in response, already absorbed in her autopsy.

Mulder made the drive to the small Virginian town where the body was discovered with the radio blaring. He hated the silence in the car; he had grown so accustomed to driving with Scully that he expected to hear her voice every time he took a car trip. The quiet was unnerving; it made the car seem empty and unnatural. As he passed a sign welcoming him to Brighton, Virginia, the music began to break up, turning completely to static within a couple more miles. Frowning, Mulder reached down to fiddle with the dial, hoping to find another station, but he discovered nothing but static. Eventually, he gave up, turning the radio off. His fingers began to drum on the steering wheel as he drove onward, attempting to dispel the eerie stillness in the car.

Fortunately, Mulder saw a sign for the local police station within a couple miles, and he turned off the highway. When he walked in, a deputy at the front of the station glanced up at him curiously. "Can I help you, sir?"

"Yes, I'm Special Agent Fox Mulder. I was looking for Chief Wilkins," Mulder introduced, pulling out his badge and showing it to the young deputy.

"He's right over there." The deputy pointed to a tall, distinguished-looking man in the corner of the station. His black hair had faded to grey in most places, but it still covered most of his head which put him a step ahead of most other men his age. He had large, beefy hands, a thick neck, and probing brown eyes.

"Thank you." Mulder moved away from the desk, approaching the man. Wilkins looked up from his desk when he heard Mulder's approach. Before Mulder could introduce himself, Wilkins spoke.

"You must be the FBI agent," he guessed.

"Yes, sir. Agent Mulder." Mulder held out a hand, and Wilkins took it, giving it a single, firm shake before releasing it. "I was actually wondering if I could take a look at where the bodies were dumped."

"Sure. I'll take you out there." The chief grabbed the jacket hanging over the back of his hands and slipped his arms into the sleeves, crossing through the maze of police officers to the front door. Mulder followed.

"It says in the police report that a couple hikers found the bodies," Mulder said as Wilkins drove to the forest.

"Yeah. I interviewed them myself when we first arrived at the scene. They seemed pretty shaken up. I doubt they had anything to do with this."

"Do you have any idea who did?"

"No, do you?"

"I'm still working on some theories."

"Well, I've got to say, I've been working in law enforcement for twenty years, and this is the most bizarre case I've seen yet. Our coroner can't offer any explanation of how these people died except that they were missing their hearts. When we found the latest two victims, we decided it was time to call you guys."

To reach the site where the bodies had been found, Mulder and Wilkins had to take a twenty minute hike into the woods. The October air was cool enough that Mulder could see his breath in front of him, but he had learned long before to ignore discomfort; he let his overcoat flap open in the gentle breeze as he walked, feeling only a slight chill.

"We found them right here," Wilkins said, pointing. Mulder knelt down in the patch of dry leaves that he indicated, searching for any signs of what might have killed the couple. Unfortunately, even his sharp eyes could not see anything of interest in the leaves. Mulder guessed that the bodies had been killed somewhere else and dumped in the clearing, but he saw no drag marks or footprints in the area. The only signs that the bodies were ever there were two small depressions in the leaves where they had been lying. Mulder moved closer to these depressions, scanning the packed leaves within them. Leaves crunched under his feet, the sound echoing loudly off the surrounding trees.

"No one lives around here?" he asked.

"There's a guy who lives another thirty minutes or so into the woods in a small cabin. He's a bit of a recluse; few people ever see him. He grows and raises his own food, pretty much never comes into town. He's not a big fan of visitors, so most people in town avoid going near his property if at all possible."

Mulder nodded, his eyes still not leaving the leaves. The wind shifted the tree branches suddenly, and a shaft of sunlight streamed through, hitting something which glinted momentarily. Curious, Mulder pulled a glove from his pocket and used it to pick up the silver object. It was small, so small that he would never have spotted it if the sun had not struck in exactly the right spot. It looked to be a clasp of some sort, likely for a bracelet or necklace.

"Was Rebecca Morris wearing any sort of jewelry?" Mulder questioned.

"No, I don't think so. Why?" Mulder held up the small clasp, and Wilkins leaned closer so that he could see it clearly. "Do you think it belonged to the killer?"

"No, I think it belonged to Rebecca Morris. Whoever did this likely ripped it off."

"What do you think it came from?"

"I don't know. Maybe a charm bracelet or locket of some kind." Mulder stopped as a sudden thought hit him. He closed his eyes for a moment, trying to picture Rebecca Morris's body—specifically, her left hand. Although he had only glimpsed the hand for a few seconds, his eidetic memory helped him to form a detailed picture of it. "Did you take the wedding rings off the victims when they came in?" Mulder asked.

Wilkins thought for a moment. "Come to think of it, we didn't. When we first found the bodies, we didn't even realize that they were married. Once we found out they were, we had already started on the autopsy and found out about the missing heart, so we really didn't think about missing rings. What do you think happened to them?"

"I'm not sure yet." Mulder turned the clasp over in his hand, staring at it blankly as he considered the evidence. For once, Mulder did not have a theory, even a wild one which would drive Scully insane. He was completely at a loss. But he knew the case was an X-file; he could sense the paranormal quality surrounding it. He just had to figure out what that quality was.

They searched the area for another twenty minutes but found no additional evidence. Straightening from his crouched position next to a copse of shrubs, Mulder placed a hand behind his back and stretched. His muscles were beginning to ache, reminding him that he had not worked out recently. After the twins' birth, he had had only a couple chances to visit the gym. He had tried to work out at home on the rare occasion that both babies were sleeping and he was not, but these work outs were still few and far between. He hoped that once the babies got a bit older, he could return to his old work out schedule before he lost all definition in his muscles.

"The other bodies were found in this forest, too, right?"

Wilkins nodded. "The last two were about ten minutes farther in, and the first two were about ten minutes more from there. That's why those corpses were in worse condition when we found them; not many people go that far into the forest. It's not exactly the most pleasant place in the world; there's no clear path, so you have to fight your way through weeds and thorns. And there's quite a bit of dangerous wildlife—rattlesnakes, copperheads, coyotes, and probably a few other things that you wouldn't want to meet up with."

"I'll take my chances," Mulder said, already walking toward a small grove of trees surrounded by a variety of smaller plants. Wilkins sighed and followed him, pulling his flashlight from his belt and using it to push aside low-hanging branches and vines as they traipsed through the forest.

A search of the other two sites yielded no additional evidence, and Mulder glanced at his watch with a sigh. If he left right then, he might be able to make it back to Scully within four hours as he had promised. But he still had a couple things left to do, so he pulled out his phone to call his partner and tell her that he would be late. The first thing he noticed were the words "No service" displayed prominently on the screen. Wilkins glanced at him from his position a few feet away where he had been searching. "You'll never get service out here," he informed Mulder. "You actually don't get it in town in very many places either. They haven't built any cell towers around here yet."

Mulder mumbled something and replaced the phone in his pocket. Turning to Wilkins, he asked, "You said that somebody lives out in these woods?"

"Yeah. Ed Wright, lives about twenty minutes that way." He pointed to his right through a thick grove of trees. "I don't know if you really want to go there though. It's even more difficult of a hike than the one we just made, and Wright isn't exactly the most accommodating person. You won't learn anything." His suggestions, however, fell on deaf ears, for Mulder had already started moving in the direction that Wilkins had pointed, leaving the police chief with little choice but to follow.

Twenty-five minutes later, the dense foliage finally gave way to a large clear patch of earth. Someone had cleared all the wild undergrowth from the forest and painstakingly planted neat rows of various crops. Mulder recognized one as corn and another as wheat, but he was no farmer, so the identity of the remaining crops remained a mystery to him. He glanced back at Wilkins who was just emerging from the trees, slightly out of breath. "Looks like the going should get easier now," Mulder observed. Wilkins wheezed slightly in answer. Mulder turned back to the small wooden cabin which stood a few hundred feet away, surrounded by the orderly crop fields. Careful to step between the rows of plants, he began walking toward it.

A loud shot rang out, echoing ominously off the trees surrounding them so that it almost sounded as if people were shooting at them from all sides. Years in the FBI had ingrained certain responses deep within Mulder, and his knee-jerk reaction in the current situation was to drop to the ground which was exactly what he did. One arm went to cover his head as his other hand reached for his gun. He looked back quickly to see that Wilkins had also dropped to the ground. Mulder inclined his head to the right, indicating that they should move in that direction, and Wilkins nodded, his hand moving slightly to grip his shotgun more tightly.

Mulder began to move along the edge of the field, still in a low crouch with his gun held at his waist, when a loud voice stopped him. "Ya'll are trespassing on my property! I've never much liked trespassers." Another shot sounded.

"I'm a federal agent!" Mulder called back, peering through the rows of corn toward the cabin. He could just barely make out a figure standing in the open front door of the small structure. He had been expecting a rheumatic old man, but what he saw surprised him. The man standing in the doorway appeared no older than Mulder himself with broad shoulders and thick, powerful limbs, likely acquired from the countless hours of manual labor it must have taken to cultivate the fields surrounding the house. The man's hair was wild and tangled, obscuring much of his face, but Mulder could clearly see his wild grey eyes even though he still stood more than two hundred feet away. Something about those eyes sent a shiver down Mulder's spine. They seemed to belong to a man who was capable of anything, a man who had no moral standards to live up to, no sense of right or wrong or duty to his fellow man. These qualities made Ed Wright a very dangerous man indeed.

"I don't care who ya are! I want you off my property." Wright cocked the shotgun again, holding it vertically as he did so. Mulder noticed that his hand was rough and tanned though much of the deep brown color was covered by a pinkish rash.

"We just want to ask you a few questions, Mr. Wright!" Mulder called, ducking lower as Wright fired again.

"I don't wanna answer no questions."

Mulder was nothing if not persistent. "Six people were killed, Mr. Wright, and their bodies were dumped in these woods."

"I don't know nothin' about that."

"Maybe you saw something."

"I didn't see nothin'," Wright insisted. "I keep to myself, don't like meddlin' in other people's business. And I don't like people meddlin' in mine." He fired a fourth shot, and it passed so close that Mulder could feel the displacement of air just over the back of his neck. He was now crouched so low that his face was below his knees.

"Mr. Wright, if you know anything-"

"I don't know nothin'. Now, if you don't get off my property, I'm goin' to stop missin'." He cocked the gun a final time and aimed. Mulder knew instinctively that he was not joking around. With no other choice, he turned and retreated back into the woods.

Wilkins was waiting for him a few feet in, having been chased away by the initial shots. "What did I tell you?" Wilkins asked as Mulder joined him. The expression on the FBI agent's face clearly betrayed the fact that he had learned nothing.

"He claims he knows nothing about the crimes."

"And you believe him?"

Mulder rubbed the back of his neck and glanced back toward the cabin. The view of the structure was already obscured by the multitude of trees as if the forest itself was conspiring to give Wright the privacy he worked so hard to obtain. "No. I think the guy's more full of shit than a colonoscopy bag."


	3. Chapter 3

During the drive back to the police station, Mulder played with the small silver clasp which he had placed in a plastic bag to stop himself from losing it. When he turned it the right way, he could just make out a small gap in the ring on one end, indicating that his first theory had been correct. Someone had ripped whatever the clasp was intended to hold on off. But he still did not know what. Or who. Or why.

Mulder sighed and glanced over at the police officer sitting in the driver's seat, staring wordlessly at the road. A cold drizzle had started to come down outside, so the windshield wipers were working steadily at clearing the moisture from the windows. The steady thumping of the plastic blades as they swept back and forth was the only sound in the car. Mulder wished Scully was the one sitting beside him. He could not wait to return to the morgue and show her the clasp so he could hear her theory on how it ended up in the woods. As frustrating as her insistence on logic could be sometimes, he knew that it had helped him in countless cases.

The forty-five minute drive to Quantico seemed interminably long, and the steady drizzle which continued to come down outside did not help matters at all. The weather seemed to be reflecting Mulder's mood—dismal and gray. He usually did not mind the rain too much; he liked how it seemed to refresh everything, leaving the air smelling clean and fresh. But this rain did not seem at all refreshing. Instead, it seemed to be adding more problems to the world, steadily pounding down on the car and drowning it under its weight.

He found Scully nearly finished with the second autopsy when he returned to the morgue. Walking over to her side, he asked, "Find your logical reason yet?"

"I'll give it to you, Mulder, this case is definitely strange." Scully pointed her left hand, which was covered in a bloody latex glove, to the open chest cavity. "The heart is missing, just like in the other five victims. But the strangest part is that this guy did not seem to have lost a lot of blood during its removal. My first guess would be that he was dead before the removal of his heart, but I cannot find another cause of death. So I looked a bit closer." Scully reached up and grabbed a magnifying lens which was attached to the metal side table on which her instruments lay. Its numerous hinges gave it good maneuverability, and she easily lined it up over the victim's heart. Mulder glanced through it but saw nothing except a red mass of veins and arteries.

"What exactly am I looking for?" he inquired.

"If you look at the tips of the blood vessels," Scully said, pointing them out, "they seem to have been cauterized."

"So someone burned his heart out? How poetic."

"It would seem that way. That would explain the lack of bleeding; the blood vessels would close back up almost immediately, so very little blood would lead out."

"Okay, but you still haven't explained how someone managed to remove his heart without ever cutting into his body."

"That's the part I was getting to. I checked all the surrounding tissue inside and the skin outside. There aren't any indications of cutting."

"But you do have a theory," Mulder guessed.

"Scientists have been trying to find techniques for non-invasive surgery for years. I think someone might have discovered a way to send a small cutting instrument of some kind into the body near the heart, possibly even a laser. All he or she would have to do then is cut through the blood vessels and connecting tissues around the heart."

"And then what? Pull it out the guy's ass? Because I don't see another way of removing it."

"He could have cut the heart into small pieces that could then be removed through whatever orifice the cutting instrument was inserted through."

"That seems a bit far-fetched for you, Agent Scully."

"But it's possible."

"Anything is possible."

"It also fits with all the evidence."

"Did you find any pieces of the heart?"

"What?"

"Well, I know when I cut anything up, I always tend to leave a piece or two lying around. It would seem that if your theory is correct, whoever was doing this would probably leave a piece or two of the heart in the body. Did you find any?"

"No," Scully admitted. "But if they had perfected this technique, it is possible that they removed all the pieces."

"You said 'they.' You think this is a group?"

"It's highly unlikely that one person could have performed such a complicated procedure without any assistance."

"You know as well as I do that serial killers don't usually work in pairs."

"It could still be a cult."

"Okay, fine. Why didn't any of the victims have defensive wounds of any kind on their bodies? I don't know about you, but if I was getting some cutting instrument shoved down my nose, I'd fight like hell to get away."

"My best guess is that they were drugged."

"By what? The tox reports for the first four victims don't show any drugs in their system."

"The body metabolizes certain drugs extremely quickly."

"So the explanation you're going with is that some cult drugged them, took them to some secret laboratory, shoved some sharp object or maybe a laser up their nose, and used this to cut the heart out."

"It doesn't have to be through the nose. They could have inserted it through the mouth and into the trachea."

"And how did this cutting instrument travel from the trachea to the heart? Did you find any holes in the trachea?"

"No, but the holes might have been too small to see."

"Then how did the pieces of the heart get back through?"

Scully thought for a minute. "Maybe they didn't."

"What?"

"There are some enzymes which break down tissue extremely quickly. Maybe whoever killed these people injected them with some sort of drug which traveled through their blood stream and began breaking down the heart muscle."

"But why didn't this enzyme also break down the surrounding tissue?"

"It could have been cultured to only kill heart muscle cells."

"Your ideas keep getting stranger, Scully. You're beginning to sound like me."

"No, it makes sense when you think about it. Oncologists have been using similar drugs for years. Not necessarily enzymes, but they have created chemotherapy drugs which specifically target only rapidly dividing cells—in other words, cancer cells. So the cancer cells die, but the other cells remain untouched."

"Yes, but those are cancer cells, Scully. These are heart cells."

"Well, heart cells have certain receptors that define them as heart cells. A drug could be created to recognize these receptors."

"I don't think so, Scully."

"Fine, Mulder, what do you think happened then?"

"I think somebody removed their hearts."

"Thank you, Mulder, but we're already aware of that. How did they do it?"

"Maybe through something as simple as a touch," Mulder speculated.

"Come on, Mulder, that's impossible. You can't get rid of somebody's heart just by touching them."

"Au contraire, Scully. The heart has long been considered the organ which represents love." Scully opened her mouth to object, but Mulder held up a hand. "Let me finish here. You know I don't like to be interrupted when I'm on a roll." Scully rolled her eyes but remained silent as he continued. "Anyway, I'm thinking that whoever—or whatever—did this feeds off that love somehow. Notice how only couples were killed. There were two sets of newlyweds and one couple who was recently engaged. Probably the only two times in most relationships where love still exists. Ours being the obvious exception, of course." He grinned at her, but Scully simply gave him her patented glare, and he quickly continued. "Anyway, I'm thinking this thing kills their love and, in doing so, destroys their hearts."

"So it's a thing now and not a person? You know, Mulder, more murders are committed by people than creatures."

"Not in our line of work."

"I'm still sticking with previous explanation."

"I expected no different. We'll see who's right in the end."

Scully sighed, knowing that no matter how much she argued, Mulder would continue to think up crazy theory after crazy theory. She rolled her head back, attempting to work out some of the kinks in her neck, and her eyes fell on the clock. "We need to get going, Mulder," she told him "We've still got a forty-five minute drive ahead of us."

Mulder nodded as she moved to retrieve the needle and thread from the table so she could begin sewing up the corpse. His hands idly moved to his pockets, and his fingers touched the smooth plastic of the evidence bag in one of them. "Hey, Scully, I meant to ask if you found any bruising on neck of the girl."

"Bruising?" Scully looked up at him, puzzled. "These people weren't strangled, Mulder, I can promise you that much."

"Not bruises from strangulation. Probably just a thin bruise on the back of the neck like something had been yanked off."

"I didn't see anything, but I'll check again." Scully moved to the square metal doors along the wall and opened one, pulling out a tray on which Rachel Morris lay. Scully pulled the white sheet down to her shoulders and turned the head to examine the back of the victim's neck. It took her a few seconds to find the faint purple line which extended across most of the back of Rebecca's neck. "There is a bruise here," Scully confirmed, looking up at Mulder. "How did you know?"

In answer, Mulder held up the evidence bag with the silver clasp. Scully stepped closer to examine it, and he handed her the bag. "What did it come from?" she asked.

Mulder was staring at the case file which lay open on the table beside him, a picture of Brett and Rebecca smiling up at them from the first page. "A locket," he answered, pointing to the small silver object which hung around Rebecca's neck in the picture.

"Where's the locket?"

"The killer must have taken it."

"So he takes trophies. That's not uncommon."

"He took the wedding rings, too."

Scully frowned slightly and glanced back at Brett's corpse. The left hand was turned, and it was obvious that Mulder was right. "Maybe they didn't put them on the morning they were taken," she suggested.

"I don't think so. The killer took them, just like he took the locket. He's taking any tangible reminders he can of their love."

"I suppose that makes a certain amount of sense. The taking of the heart is also symbolic. I mean, you said it yourself: the heart has long been considered a symbol for love. By taking it, the killer is denying the victims their love."

"Maybe." Mulder was still staring at the picture, trying to imagine how two people who had seemed so happy and carefree could now be lying on a cold, metal table.

"Give me ten minutes, and then I'll be ready to go," Scully said. Mulder nodded.

When they arrived home, they found two wide-awake babies, both of whom were perched in their bouncers while their proud grandmother watched from the couch, passing them various toys. "How'd it go, Mom?" Scully asked. Maggie jumped slightly and turned to face the two agents.

"Fox, Dana, I didn't hear you come in. How was work?"

"A bit tiring, but overall not too bad," Scully answered, slipping her arms out of her coat as Mulder pulled it from her shoulders. He left to hang both their coats in the hall closet while she approached Samantha who eagerly held out her arms, babbling something. Smiling, Scully picked up the infant and kissed her forehead.

"Well, these two were perfect angels. They've already had both their naps for today, and I fed them both a little over an hour ago. They're both very active babies, especially Samantha. Not at all like you; you were always more subdued. Melissa, however. . ." Maggie's voice trailed off as she remembered her oldest daughter.

"Yeah, Mulder and I are wondering what we're going to do once they start crawling," Scully remarked, attempting to dispel some of the tension which had settled in the room at the mention of her older sister. "Sometimes, it's hard to keep up with them now, and they're only four months old."

"You know, if you two ever want a break, I'd be happy to take them for the night."

"Thanks, Mom, but we're okay."

"Dana, you're both tired; I can tell that. Trust me, I know how much taking care of a baby can drain you, and you have two of them. Plus your jobs."

"We'll be okay, Mom. Really."

Maggie looked doubtful. "Okay, but the offer is good anytime."

"Thanks, Mom," Scully said again as she hugged her mother. Maggie kissed the top of Samantha's head before bending down to do the same to Melissa. Mulder had reentered the room by that time, and she gave him an affectionate pat on the shoulder as she walked out.

"Take care, Fox. I'll see you tomorrow."

"I'll see you out," Mulder offered chivalrously.

"No, don't worry about it, I know my way to the front door. You just go say hi to your daughters. I know you've been dying to see them all day." Mulder's grin betrayed the veracity of her statement, and she gave him another pat before leaving.

"How's my little Hopper doing?" Mulder questioned, approaching Melissa who reached out to him. She was usually less vocal than her sister, but she still seemed to relish the attention her parents bestowed on her just as much as Samantha did.

"Mulder, I've told you to call them by their actual names so they learn to recognize them," Scully reminded him, wincing as Samantha grabbed a fistful of her hair. Using the hand not holding the baby, she gently tried to pry the auburn strands from Samantha's small, chubby fingers, noticing that the infant's fingers were coated with drool. Scully supposed she had had worse in her hair over the years.

"Plenty of parents call their kids by nicknames, and their kids still learn their actual names just fine," Mulder protested.

"Yes, but most parents give normal nicknames like Princess or Sweetheart. They don't call their kids by the last name of an actor who plays some crazed bomber or by a person who claims to raise the dead."

"Scully, if I ever did anything normal, I think you'd send me to the hospital to have my head examined," Mulder remarked with a grin. And he was right.

Since Scully was too tired to make dinner, Mulder cooked some pasta and warmed a can of tomato sauce. It was one meal he could actually manage, so they had ended up eating quite a lot of spaghetti over the past four months. At Scully's insistence, he also tossed a small salad as she watched from the table where she was breastfeeding Melissa. Samantha lay in her bouncer on a nearby chair. She was not happy with this arrangement, and she made her displeasure known. Scully attempted to calm her by rocking her from time to time, but her wails did not lessen. Eventually, Mulder gave in to her pleas and lifted her into his arms, holding her as he continued to stir the pasta and sauce one-handed. Samantha loved to be held—especially if Melissa was also being held. Every time she felt that her sister was receiving more attention than she was, she would cry until one of her parents picked her up, too.

They played the usual game of pass the babies as they ate dinner, and Scully cleaned up afterward while Mulder carried both girls to the bathroom for their baths. Scully helped dress them before taking Samantha out to the back porch where an old wooden swing hung. She sat down on it, singing softly as she rocked slowly back and forth. She expected Mulder to join her with Melissa, but he remained inside, preferring to put her to sleep by pacing the room instead. Scully knew that this preference indicated that he was thinking hard, likely about their current case. When Mulder was deep in thought he was oddly similar to Melissa—he needed to be in constant motion.

Samantha fell asleep shortly before nine, and Scully padded quietly into the house and deposited the baby in the crib, gently caressing her downy head. She seemed so small and vulnerable lying in the crib, her body slightly curled. And she was vulnerable. She depended on Mulder and Scully for everything—food, shelter, protection, and love. It was a huge responsibility and yet it was also immensely satisfying. Scully enjoyed caring for her daughter. She relished the knowledge that she and Mulder were going to be the driving force in the small girl's future.

Scully attempted to read over the case file for a little bit before she went to bed, but it did nothing except frustrate her further. She set it aside, reaching instead for one of the latest fiction novels she was reading, a medical thriller by Robin Cook. Eventually, her eyesight began to grow fuzzy, and Scully put the book back on the table beside the bed, removing her reading glasses. Mulder still had not come to bed; Scully supposed he was either still trying to put Melissa to sleep or had become distracted by a new thought he had about the case. Either way, she knew he would come to bed eventually, so she was not going to worry about him. Shutting off the lamp above the bed, she rolled over and closed her eyes.


	4. Chapter 4

As usual, the crying of one of her daughters awoke her the next morning. She rolled over to see Mulder still snoring beside her. He was lying on his back with one arm hanging off the bed and one flung across his face. He looked as if he was still dead asleep; Scully wondered what time he had finally come to bed the previous night. Likely, it had been fairly late, for if he had gone to bed at his normal time, he would have already been awake.

Deciding that he needed a little more sleep, Scully turned the volume down on the baby monitor and carefully sat up, untangling herself from the sheets so she could rise from the bed. She padded softly to the nursery and found Samantha awake and crying in a way that Scully had learned long before meant she was hungry. Picking up the baby, she settled into the rocking chair to feed her.

Mulder walked into the room still rubbing sleep from his eyes just as Melissa was finishing. "I was trying to let you get a little more sleep," Scully told him.

"I need to be up anyway," Mulder said. He glanced around the room, noticing Samantha lying in her crib, her bright blue eyes, so similar to those of her mother, wide open. Mulder was glad that both babies had retained the blue tint to their eyes as they grew older. Scully's eyes were one of his favorite features, and he was proud that his daughters had inherited them.

For once, Samantha was not crying because of the lack of attention her parents were giving her. She seemed oddly fascinated by her toes; her foot swung wildly in the air above her head, and she giggled as she attempted to grab her tiny, socked foot in her fist. Mulder watched for a moment, bemused, before turning back to Scully. "Since we're all up, I was thinking of trying out that new jogging stroller you bought me for my birthday last week."

"Sure. It could be fun. Just let me finish up here and change clothes."

"Okay. I'll take burping duty," Mulder offered.

After a jog and shower, Scully was sitting in the living room sipping coffee. Both babies were in bouncers beside her, content to play with the few small toys each had in front of her. Hearing the doorbell ring, Scully took a single glance at the two girls and decided to let them be. She opened the door to let her mother in. Immediately, Maggie moved toward the living room, and she greeted her youngest grandchildren with a warm smile. "How are my little darlings?" she cooed.

"Good to see I'm appreciated," Scully muttered from the doorway before moving away, leaving her mother to fawn over the babies alone. She automatically walked to her and Mulder's bedroom. He had just stepped out of the shower and stood in the room wearing nothing but a pair of black boxers, toweling his hair dry. Scully watched him for a moment, admiring the play of muscles on his back and across his shoulders. As always, he felt her gaze, and he raised his eyes so that they could meet hers in the mirror.

"What's up?" he asked.

"Nothing. My mom's here; she's already with the babies."

"She's going to spoil them rotten."

"They're her youngest grandkids and the ones who live closest. Of course she's going to spoil them rotten."

"You come up here for something?"

"Just this." Scully moved closer, insinuating herself between him and the dresser. Standing on her toes, she managed to press her lips to his. His response was immediate; he released the undershirt he had been holding, allowing it to fall to the ground. She pushed her tongue into his mouth forcefully, and he responded with equal intensity. Their tongues dueled, matching each other lunge for lunge and parry for parry. Scully pressed her body closer against his, forcing him backwards, and he moved until he reached the bed. Sitting on the edge of the bed, he wrapped his arms around her waist, bringing her between his legs, still kissing fiercely.

"Dana, I just wanted-oh!" Maggie's comment broke off quite suddenly as she saw the scene in front of her. Scully's face reddened as she pulled away from Mulder, stepping out from his arms. Maggie looked similarly embarrassed; she stood in the doorway holding Samantha, torn between leaving them alone and asking what she had come to ask.

"What is it, Mom?" Scully asked, attempting to act naturally. Mulder had moved to the bathroom, embarrassed not so much by the position he and Scully were in when her mother walked in as by his lack of clothing.

"I was just going to ask about diapers. You seemed to be running low yesterday." Maggie's eyes were focused intently on the carpet beneath her feet. She harbored no false illusions about her daughter's love life; she knew she was sexually active. The proof rested in Maggie's arms. And she had seen her daughter and Mulder displaying their affection for one another on numerous occasions. Usually, however, their displays of affection were not quite so intense. They might share a short kiss or a small caress. The heated kiss Maggie had just witnessed, however, was something they reserved for when they were alone. It was special, private, and Maggie regretted that she had interrupted their privacy.

"There are extras in the hall closet if you need any. But we just opened a new pack last night," Scully said.

"Oh, okay. Well, then, I'll let you get back to. . . getting dressed." And with that, Maggie turned and left the room. A few seconds later, the door to the bathroom opened, and Mulder emerged now wearing slacks and his undershirt. He had slipped his arms into his dress shirt, but he had not yet begun to button it.

"So, are you grounded for life?" he quipped. Scully hit him lightly on his upper arm, and he chuckled as he began to slip the buttons of his shirt into their holes. "Come on, it was bound to happen eventually. Surely she's walked in on you kissing boys before."

"Actually, she hasn't. At least, not kissing like that."

"Really?" Mulder's fingers finished with the buttons, and he turned to her, his eyebrows raised. "I find that hard to believe."

"I've always been careful."

"Which is why you kissed me with our bedroom door open when your mother was just downstairs." Mulder grinned at her as he grabbed his tie from the chair.

"Well, my actions may have been a bit impetuous."

"Good to see I make you impetuous." He leaned forward, pressing his lips to hers again before she could object. They kissed for a minute or so until Scully pulled away. She wore a small smile as she ran a hand down his arm.

"Come on. We have to get to work."

"Coming." Her hand had reached his, and he turned his own hand so that he could fit their fingers together, reaching for his jacket with his free arm.

They said a quick goodbye to Maggie and the girls before walking out to the car. "I was thinking we could talk to the friends of some of the victims today," Mulder said. "I got a list from Chief Wilkins yesterday."

"I guess it's as good of a place to start as any," Scully agreed.

They stopped first at a modest-sized white clapboard house surrounded by a short, black iron fence. Mulder glanced at the address Wilkins had provided before shutting off the car and stepping out. "This is the house of Anita and Mitchell Williams," he announced, pushing open the gate which blocked the path and allowing Scully to step through first. "They lived next to the first victims." Scully glanced to her left and then right where she spotted a house similar to the one they were approaching but with an undeniable emptiness surrounding it. No curtains graced the windows, no toys were scattered throughout the front yard, and no car waited in the driveway.

By this time, they had reached the doorway. Mulder rang the bell, and a woman in her early thirties answered. She looked from one agent to the other, her eyebrows inching closer together and her green eyes sparkling with puzzlement. "Yes?"

"I'm Special Agent Mulder with the FBI, and this is my partner, Dana Scully," Mulder introduced as they both displayed their badges. "Are you Anita Williams?" She nodded. "We're here about Brenda and Rick Hampton."

The creases in the woman's brow deepened, and her full lips drooped slightly. "Come on in," she offered, stepping out of the doorway. They followed her into a living room, and she offered them a seat on a plush, burgundy couch.

"How well did you know Brenda and Rick?" Scully asked once all three were comfortably seated.

"I knew Brenda pretty well; both Rick and Mitchell, my husband, work full time, so we often found ourselves at home alone with nothing to do. They just moved here a few months ago, so I was helping her meet new people. We were both big tennis players, so we joined the neighborhood tennis club, and we spent a lot of hours playing."

"What about Rick?" Though Mulder was sitting next to her on the couch, they were not touching. At home, they usually sat as close as possible, both feeling an inexplicable desire to feel the other's touch at all times. But at work, they were complete professionals—they always kept a small space between them. Scully thought trying to maintain a private romantic relationship and a platonic professional one would be like living a double life, but she soon realized that both she and Mulder adapted easily to both roles. At work, it was natural to remain professional, relying on one another for support and back up just as they had done for the initial years of their partnership. And at home, it was natural to allow passion and desire to take over so that they could take comfort in the touch of the other that they had denied themselves for so long.

"I didn't know him nearly as well. He worked at a law firm downtown; Brenda mentioned it from time to time, but I got the impression that she didn't really know much about his job. He came over for dinner a couple times, and I saw him at one or two neighborhood functions, but he mostly kept to himself. I never really saw him talk to anyone except for Brenda."

"What was their relationship like?" Scully asked,

Anita's face took on a wistful look. "It was just like the relationship of most newlyweds. Are either of you two married?"

Mulder and Scully exchanged a look, and Mulder finally said, "Not exactly."

"Well, when you do get married, you'll find that the giddiness of the wedding wears off pretty quickly. For the first few months, everything seems perfect. You think you're completely in love, that nothing can tear the two of you apart. But then reality sets in, and you realize that nothing is truly forever."

"So which part of the relationship were Brenda and Rick in?"

"They were still in the giddy newlywed phase. He'd call her two or three times a day while he was at work, and they'd talk for a few minutes each time. Before he went anywhere, he would kiss her, even if he was only going to be gone for a few minutes. And she talked about him constantly—how sweet and attentive he was, how smart, how talented, how accomplished. They really did love one another."

"So there were no problems?"

"Not as far as I could tell. I'm sure they would have come up eventually, but they were too happy with their lives and each other for problems."

"Did Brenda mention any enemies?" Scully questioned.

"No, not to me. I don't think she had any either. She was non-confrontational."

"What about Rick? You said he worked for a law firm. Maybe one of his clients or someone he argued against didn't like the outcome of a case," Scully suggested.

"Like I said before, I didn't really know much about Rick's work. I certainly don't know if he made any enemies there. I'm sorry."

"Did you notice any strange behavior lately?"

"No, everything was pretty normal around here."

"What about a strange car parked in the street sometimes. Or maybe someone lurking around the house who you didn't recognize."

"No, nothing like that. Everything's been quiet."

"Okay. Thank you for your time, Mrs. Mitchell. We'll be in touch if we have any further questions." Mulder stood, and he and Scully left the house.

They stopped next at the law firm where Rick had worked, hoping that someone there might be able to give the more information about potential enemies. As they exited the car, Mulder remarked, "I would hate to make that drive every day."

"It's one of the hazards of living in a small town," Scully told him.

"You try to get away from the world only to realize that you need the world to function," Mulder said, striding toward the towering building in front of them.

"Sometimes, I think it might be nice to get away from the world for a little while."

"Is that a hint, Scully?"

"No. I'm just saying that I understand where they're coming from."

When they first walked into the office building, a smiling receptionist greeted them. "Do you have an appointment?" she questioned brightly, her fingers already poised over the keyboard. Mulder glanced at Scully before removing his badge from his pocket.

"We're here about Rick Hampton," Mulder explained.

The receptionist's smile faded somewhat. "Oh. It's so sad what happened to him. Everybody was talking about it when they found them. I just can't believe that someone would do something so horrible. Have you found who did it?"

"We're working on that, ma'am," Scully assured her. "We were just wondering if you could think of anyone who knew Rick well and might be able to give us more information about Rick."

The receptionist paused for a moment. "Well, Rick was pretty new here. He's only been here a few months; I think his wife grew up around here and wanted to stay. Of course, I never talked to him that much. Try Neil Mason; I know he and Rick have worked a couple cases together, and they seem to be fairly close. His office is on the fifth floor. Number 539."

"Okay. Thank you very much," Scully said as she and Mulder turned toward the elevator. They rode up to the fifth floor in silence; once there, it did not take long to discover Neil Mason's office. He was a tall man, likely around 6'3" or 6'4" though it was hard to estimate when he was sitting down; he was solidly built, seeming almost too big for the suit he wore. At first glance, Scully would say he was likely in his late forties though on further inspection, she decided he was likely younger than that. His hair had already turned silver, but his face still only had a few shallow lines, and his green eyes were still clear and strong. He was on the phone when they first arrived; he held up a single finger as he finished his conversation. When he had hung up, he beckoned the two agents into his office.

"I'm going to guess you two aren't my 11:00," he remarked.

"We're Agents Mulder and Scully with the FBI," Scully introduced, showing her badge. He glanced at it and nodded.

"Are you two here about a client? Because I usually don't deal with federal cases."

"Actually, we're here about Rick Hampton. We heard you two were close."

"Well, we were as close as two coworkers with almost a ten year difference in age could be. I'd say he was more like my younger brother."

"But you have worked with him on some cases."

"I have. He was a good litigator. He had an ability to present the facts in such a way that everybody understood, and he was quick on his feet. He always seemed to be prepared for whatever the prosecutor threw at us. It was a pleasant change; so many of the new lawyers have no courtroom experience whatsoever, and they always seem to clam up when the opposing side throws a curve ball. But Rick would just roll with the punches; he could continue flawlessly no matter what happened."

"Can you think of anyone who might have wanted to harm Rick?" Scully questioned.

Mason paused for a moment in thought before nodding slowly. "We had a case a few weeks ago. A man was gunned down in an attempt to rob a small convenience store. Two kids were arrested not too long after the shooting; honestly, I had no doubt in my mind that they had done it. Their fingerprints were on the gun used for the shooting and all over the store. One of their jackets was found a couple blocks from the crime scene, and blood from the store owner was found on both their clothes. Basically, it was an open and shut case. I'm sure the cops were thinking that it would be an easy conviction. Hell, I was thinking that, and I was defending them. But Rick thought differently; he was determined that we could win. I brushed him off, telling him that he was crazy, that the case was hopeless. Honestly, I didn't really want to work on it too hard; I knew those kids were guilty, and I thought they should be punished. Probably not the best attitude for a defense attorney, but I can't help how I feel. So I pushed it to the side, but Rick decided to prove me wrong. He worked on that case nonstop for a couple weeks. And then when we got to the courtroom, he argued flawlessly, and the kids got off on some technicality. In some ways, I really wish they hadn't, but let's just say that that got my boss's attention, so I wasn't complaining. As we left the courtroom, though, the brother of the man who was killed pulled Rick aside. I couldn't really understand what was said, but the gestures and facial expressions made it pretty clear that he was angry, and rightly so. I'm fairly certain he was threatening Rick."

"Could you provide the name of this brother?"

"Howard Lamara. He works at the same convenience store. It was supposed to be his shift that night."

Twenty minutes later, Scully and Mulder pulled up in front of the small, nondescript convenience store. As they stepped out of the car, Mulder donned his sunglasses, glancing around him. Everything seemed normal; a couple cars were parked at the old, rusty pumps, their owners leaning against their fenders as they waited for their tanks to fill. One of the men was smoking a cigarette, completely ignoring the No Smoking signs which were faded and peeling anyway. The other man had his attention focused on the cars whizzing by on the busy highway which bordered the parking lot. Scully also gave the lot a cursory glance before focusing her attention back on Mulder who had already started toward the building.

A bell above the door jangled as they stepped inside, and the kid behind the counter glanced up at them before returning his attention to the magazine he had been reading. Mulder and Scully approached him, and he looked up again as they grew closer, wearing an expression of bored indifference. "Yeah?" he asked.

"We're Agents Mulder and Scully with the FBI," Mulder introduced, producing his shield. "We were wondering if we could speak with Howard Lamara."

"H!" the cashier called loudly, eliciting a grunt from the back of the store. A well-built, olive-skinned man in his late twenties appeared from behind a couple shelves of junk food holding a number of bags of hard candy. "There's some people here to see ya. Say they're feds."

Lamara's eyes grew wide, and without warning, he had turned, dropping the bags he was holding as he ran off toward the back entrance. Mulder sighed, side-stepped a nearby display case, and took off after him. Though Lamara had a head start, Mulder's long legs allowed him to gain some ground as he followed the younger man through a narrow back alleyway, splashing through the puddles caused by the rain a few days before. He heard the click of Scully's heels behind him, her shorter legs, as usual, preventing her from keeping pace with his longer strides.

They rounded a corner onto a street with the distance between the two men still shrinking. As Lamara started down another alley, Mulder cut the corner a bit closer and managed to come close enough to grab Lamara around the waist, tackling him to the ground. Lamara fought for a moment before settling down when Mulder placed handcuffs around his wrist. By this time, Scully had managed to catch up to the two men, and she helped Mulder haul Lamara to his feet.


	5. Chapter 5

Twenty minutes later, Lamara sat in an interrogation room, his hands fidgeting on the table in front of him. "He looks nervous," Mulder observed, watching from behind the two-way mirror.

Scully nodded. "I don't think he did it though. He doesn't seem like the type to cut out someone's heart."

"I didn't know that there was a type for that."

"I'm just saying that he doesn't seem like someone who could perform such delicate surgery."

"This isn't your typical surgery."

"Why should we assume that it's anything but that?"

"Because knowing the cases we attract, it likely is." Mulder turned, walking out of the viewing room and into the interrogation room with Scully trailing behind him. As soon as they entered, Lamara looked up.

"I didn't do nothing," he insisted, repeating the only words he had said since being arrested. Scully's eyebrows rose.

"Funny. In my experience, innocent people usually don't run."

"I knew you'd assume I did something. But that shit ain't mine."

"It isn't yours?" Scully questioned, pretending she knew what he was talking about (she had strong suspicions that she did actually know though she did not have definite proof of anything).

"No. A friend asked me to watch it. I didn't even know what was in those bags at first; as soon as I figured it out, I hid them. But it's not mine."

"And who would this friend be?" Mulder questioned.

"I'm not saying. I don't betray my friends."

They asked him a few more questions, and he all but admitted to dealing drugs; however, this information led them no closer to finding their killer. By the time they left the interrogation room, both Mulder and Scully were convinced that he had nothing to do with the murders. "I guess this means we're back square one," Mulder remarked, holding the door open for Scully.

"Hooray. More interviews," she said dully.

Three interviews later, they still had not discovered any useful information. "By all accounts, we have three perfectly happy couples who were very much in love and somehow ended up dead," Mulder remarked as they started back toward the latest victims' house.

"Maybe it was some kind of a lover's pact," Scully mused.

"What? 'You take out your heart, and I'll take out mine'?"

Scully sighed. "I guess it doesn't make that much sense."

"Not much about this case makes sense." Mulder stopped in front of the Morris's house. Yellow crime scene tape still blocked the doorway, but Mulder ducked under it and entered the house. Though the lights were off, the windows emitted enough light to make a flashlight unnecessary. Slowly, Mulder began to move through the house, searching for any clues as to what had occurred.

"Signs of a struggle," Scully noted as they entered the living room. The pages from a couple newspapers were spread across the room, and a lamp had been knocked off a table. The bulb had shattered, and Scully stepped carefully around the small shards of broken glass as she walked further into the room.

"The phone's off the hook," Mulder noted, pointing. "Maybe they tried to call 911."

"Maybe." Scully's eyes swept over the sofa, expensive television set, and stereo system before coming to rest on something shiny in the corner of the room, partially concealed by the speakers on the stereo system. Wondering if it was another clasp similar to the one Mulder had found, Scully walked toward it. Her foot stepped on a piece of discarded paper, and it gave a loud crackle. She froze, her hand dropping to her weapon. Mulder also turned, already drawing his weapon from his holster. When he saw what had happened, he gave a shaky laugh.

"I guess we're a bit on the edge."

"Yeah." Scully began to move again, kneeling down beside the stereo. Pulling on a latex glove, she reached out and picked up the shiny object, holding it between her thumb and forefinger as she raised her hand so that the light hit it.

"What did you find?" Mulder questioned, crouching beside her.

"It's a needle, likely from a hypodermic syringe," Scully told him, still fingering the slender silver object.

"Did you find any puncture marks on the victims?"

Scully shook her head. "No, but a needle this small likely wouldn't leave much of a mark. I might have overlooked it."

"So the murderer drugged them?"

"That would be my guess. It would explain the lack of blood; the murderer likely did not remove their hearts here."

"So where did he remove their hearts?"

"I don't know, but my guess is that if you find that place, you'll find our murderer." Scully held out a hand, and Mulder reached into his pocket and pulled out an evidence bag. He held it open, allowing her to drop the thin needle inside. Sealing it, Scully took the bag from his hands and tucked it into her coat pocket.

The remainder of their search turned up nothing new. The rest of the rooms seemed to be orderly and neat, so the agents speculated that the fight had not taken place in any room but the living room. Mulder pulled the door closed behind them as they walked out, taking a final look at the foyer. The sun was slowly sinking, and the foyer was darker than it had been when they first arrived. This new grayish color served as a reminder of what had occurred in the house. The color hinted of destruction, of horrors too impossible to conceive.

With a slight shiver that may or may not have been caused by the chilly wind, Mulder shut the door firmly and turned to Scully, pulling his coat tighter around his body. He wanted nothing more than to go home and play with Samantha and Melissa, to listen to them babble incoherently, to watch them grin at the smallest things. They were his refuge from the horrors of the world, his anchors from the tumultuous destruction that seemed to constantly swirl around him. It was a nice feeling to know that he had something to go home to other than an empty apartment and food which was so out of date it was barely recognizable. It was wonderful to think that for the first time in his life, he had a family.


	6. Chapter 6

They found that Maggie had made dinner for him, but she refused their entreaties for her to stay and share it, claiming that she did not want to intrude on their family time. Eventually, both Mulder and Scully gave up attempting to persuade her. It seemed that Scully came by her stubbornness honestly.

They avoided the topic of the case during dinner, both feeling a subconscious need to focus on something else, even if it was just for a couple hours. They simply enjoyed the time they could spend with their daughters and act like a normal couple who did not face monsters and powerful, murderous government conspirators on a daily basis. After dinner, they sat down to watch a movie, each holding one of their daughters. Since both had seen the movie before, neither paid much attention to it, focusing instead on the two squirming babies in their laps. Samantha found Scully's hair oddly fascinating, and she spent the better part of thirty minutes attempting to capture it with her tiny fist. Scully continuously tugged the crimson strands from her daughter's grip, but Samantha had the persistence of her father (who watched the entire scene with a smile, not bothering to offer help).

Melissa, who was usually fairly well-behaved except when around her sister, decided to emulate Samantha's example. Unfortunately, she could not reach her father's hair, so she settled for grabbing the appendage that was within easy reach—his nose. Although only four months old, her grip was surprisingly strong, and Mulder pulled away with a yelp. "What was that for?" he asked indignantly. The baby gave him a wide, toothless grin. Scully laughed. "Good to see I have your support," Mulder remarked, glaring at her.

"Just like I have yours?" she asked as Samantha tugged again. She turned back to the baby, scolding lightly, though the smile on her face belied her harsh words.

"Every man for himself," Mulder declared.

The remainder of movie watching passed relatively uneventfully. By the time the credits began to roll, both babies were fast asleep, their bodies limp in their parents' arms. Scully was having trouble keeping her eyes open; she yawned widely, and Mulder remarked, "Come on. Let's get these three sleepy people here to bed."

"Just three? What about you?" Scully questioned.

"I'm a chronic insomniac. I don't get tired."

"Yeah right."

After putting the babies to bed, Scully settled in the bed, taking her book from the nightstand so she could read for a bit before going to bed. Mulder emerged from the bathroom after a couple minutes, scratching his left arm. "Scully, can you look at this rash for me?" he questioned, approaching her. She lowered her book slightly so that she could peer at the arm he held out to her. It was covered in a red rash. On closer inspection, Scully noticed that his right arm had the same coloring.

"I think it's poison ivy," Scully told him, leaning closer. "Or maybe poison oak. You probably got it traipsing around in the woods yesterday." Mulder groaned, still digging his fingers into his skin in an attempt to quell the itching. Scully stilled his hand by grabbing it with her own. "Don't scratch. It'll leave scars."

"But it itches," Mulder argued.

"Tough it out. There's probably some hydrocortisone cream in the bathroom if it's really bad." Mulder mumbled an unintelligible response and turned back toward the bathroom. Scully heard him open the door of the cabinet and shuffle through the medicines located there. After a couple minutes, he again entered the room and approached Scully, holding out the tube of cream. She glanced up at him.

"I need you to put some on my back," he told her, pulling his shirt over his head and turning around. Scully immediately saw the red rash covering his shoulder blades.

"How did you get it on your back?" Scully wondered.

"I don't know."

"Did you touch your back at all while you were in the woods? The urushiol could have been transferred from your hands to your back."

Mulder shrugged. "I guess I might have." He relaxed visibly as Scully gently rubbed the hydrocortisone into his skin. When she finished, she handed him the tube and he thanked her before carrying it back to the bathroom. This time when he came out, he climbed into bed with Scully, giving her a lengthy kiss before settling down beneath the covers.

Despite his earlier words, Mulder fell asleep soon after his head hit the pillow and slept soundly until the babies woke him early the next morning. The wails also woke Scully who struggled out of bed, rubbing sleep from her eyes. Though they had been waking up at odd hours for months, the babies' early schedules still left both partners catatonic for the first part of the day. Mulder usually cured his exhaustion with a long run and a cold shower, but this had proved difficult to manage with two newborns in the house.

But he had managed the previous morning, and he was determined to continue the pattern. Together, he and Scully managed to feed and change both babies and strap them into the stroller before the sun had fully risen in the sky. As he had suspected, a long jog woke him up quite nicely, and he was whistling as he showered and pulled on slacks and an undershirt. For some reason, he felt extraordinarily happy that day. He felt indestructible, believing that nothing could possibly go wrong.

He was still whistling as he poured himself a bowl of cereal one-handed, bouncing Melissa on one hip. He sank into a seat beside Samantha who grinned at him from her bouncer, holding a spit-covered pacifier out for him. He refused the gift with a small laugh. "No thanks, Mance, I think that's your pacifier for good now." The baby seemed to understand; she cocked her head to one side, considering for a moment, before returning the pacifier to her mouth. Mulder reached out to ruffle her wispy hair affectionately before turning back to his breakfast.

Scully entered the kitchen a few minutes later, and Samantha immediately began to fuss to be held. Obligingly, Scully picked her up and also prepared her breakfast one-handed. They ate quickly, and Scully soon noticed Mulder's ebullience. "Any reason why you're so happy?" she inquired.

Mulder shrugged. "I've got a good job, a wonderful partner whom I love more than life itself, and two smart, beautiful daughters. Why shouldn't I be happy?"

"You just seem. . . especially happy today."

"Well, it's a beautiful day." Scully shook her head at him, and he became defensive. "What? You're telling me that you've never woken up and thought to yourself, 'This is a great day'?"

"Maybe once or twice," Scully admitted.

"Exactly. Well, Scully, _this_ is a beautiful day." With that, he shot her an award-winning smile. Scully could not help herself. She smiled back.

After leaving the girls with Maggie, the two agents headed off to Quantico. Luckily, the morgue had not yet released the bodies of the latest two victims, so Scully was able to examine them for puncture marks. It took Scully nearly ten minutes of looking to locate the first one. "Here it is," she announced, pointing to a small dot on the right side of Rachel Morris's neck. Mulder was not surprised that she had missed it on her initial examination; it was so small that he could barely see it even now that he knew where it was and what he was looking for.

"So the murderer drugged them."

"It would seem that way."

Mulder was shaking his head. He straightened, walking to the end of the table in agitation before turning and coming back again. "It doesn't make any sense," he said. "I thought that this might be a case of psychic surgery, but there would be no reason for the surgeon to have to put them to sleep. Actually, the entire situation seems wrong. There should not have been a struggle with psychic surgery."

"Maybe it's not psychic surgery then."

"I haven't heard a better explanation from you."

"I still don't think it's supernatural. I mean, why would someone with a supernatural ability need to anesthetize his victims?"

Mulder absent-mindedly shook his head, his attention focused elsewhere. He was staring at a spot on the wall a few feet in front of him, obviously deep in thought. Scully waited silently, knowing he would speak when he was ready. Finally, he said, "I want to go back to the woods."

"Why?"

"I just feel like I'm missing something."

"And you have to go back to the woods to find it?" Mulder nodded. Sighing, Scully glanced at her watch. They had plenty of time left in the day, and she certainly did not have a better idea. "Fine," she agreed. "Just let me clean up here."

An hour later, Scully was beginning to wish she had not agreed to accompany Mulder on his trip through the woods. Her high heels and knee-length business skirt did not lend themselves well to scrambling over the dense undergrowth. Mulder strode slightly ahead of her, seemingly unaffected by the vines and other plants which grabbed at Scully's feet. Scully's foot hit a particularly large root in front of her, and she stumbled, throwing her hands in front of her to catch herself when she fell. But before she hit the ground, she felt Mulder's strong hand on her arm, balancing her. "Careful. It's pretty easy to lose your footing in here," he told her.

"I gathered that." Scully righted herself, tugging lightly on her skirt. Once satisfied that she was okay, Mulder continued on.

They finally stopped at the first dump site. Scully was not sure how Mulder recognized it, for it looked to be the same as every other square inch of woods that surrounded them. But Mulder seemed sure of himself, so Scully had no choice but to trust him. "What exactly are we looking for?" she questioned.

"Anything out of the ordinary." Mulder answered. He had already crouched down in front of a tree a few feet to Scully's right and was examining the patch of dirt beneath it.

"How specific," Scully muttered under her breath as she, too, crouched down, careful to keep her clothes from touching the moist ground. She had cleaned enough mud stains out of her business suits over the years and did not wish to create any more. As much as she loved her job, there were certain aspects she could certainly do without. Its effect on clothing was one.

Thirty minutes later, Mulder stood up and began pacing around the outer edge of the clearing, growing increasingly impatient with each step. Scully also straightened and walked over, moving in front of him so that he had to stop. "I don't think there's anything here," she told him.

"There has to be something," he insisted.

"Mulder, the local police have checked this area, you checked it yesterday, and we've now both checked it again. Trust me, we haven't missed anything. Now, let's get out of here before you manage to get poison ivy again."

Suddenly, Mulder visibly perked up. His head raised, and Scully saw a glimmer in his eyes that she knew meant one thing—he had figured out something about the case. "Ed Wright!" he exclaimed.

"Who?" Scully asked.

"He's a recluse. He lives a little ways into the woods, grows his own food, scorns all human contact, etc."

"What about him?"

"I think he's somehow involved in the killings."

"What makes you say that?"

"I went to talk to him the other day, and he gave me a. . . less-than-friendly greeting."

"How come you didn't tell me about this before? And what do you mean by less-than-friendly?"

"I didn't learn anything from him. He pulled out a shotgun and started shooting at me, so I didn't get much of a chance to question him."

"Why didn't you arrest him?"

"I may be a bit reckless, Scully, but I'm not completely insane. Especially since I have a reason to stay alive now. He was about to start shooting to kill, and I had no backup since Wilkins had already run off. Besides, I didn't really have a reason to suspect him other than the fact that he lived reasonably close to where the bodies were dumped. But now I do."

"Why?"

"When he was holding up the gun, I noticed he had a red rash of some kind on his hand. It looked suspiciously like this." Mulder held up his own hand where the red color from the poison ivy still shone brightly on the flesh.

"That doesn't mean anything. He lives in the forest. He could have contacted poison ivy anywhere."

"I doubt it. Wilkins says he rarely ever leaves his house and yard. Besides, he had it on his hands. Last I checked, poison ivy isn't that tall."

"So you think Wright is our killer?"

"No. I think Wright is helping our killer. Whatever it is."

"Mulder, from what you've told me, Wright is our best suspect right now. Don't go chasing monsters that aren't there."

"They're there, Scully. We just have to learn to look for them."

"What are we going to do now?"

"I'm going to call Wilkins and tell him what we've found. I'll see if he can get an arrest warrant for the guy so we can bring him in." Mulder pulled out his cellphone and cursed when he saw the screen. "They need to build a cell tower in this place," he muttered, walking from one side of the clearing to another, hoping that he might suddenly pick up a signal though he knew he would have no luck. When he had paced around the entire clearing, he cursed vehemently once more before turning to Scully. "Looks like we're going to have to go back."

"We don't necessarily need a warrant. We could always just bring him in for questioning," Scully suggested, loathe to hike back through the forest.

"Looks like I'm rubbing off on you," Mulder remarked. "But I've already been shot at once by this guy, and I have a feeling his aim will be better if I come back a second time. I'd like to keep my head."

"How do you plan on arresting him then?"

"We bring in the cavalry," Mulder told her. "If his house is surrounded by armed policemen, he might be more receptive to a conversation."

"Or he can become more hostile and start shooting randomly."

"We'll be wearing vests. You're the one who's always telling me to play more by the book, Scully." His eyes twinkled, and she sighed, glancing at the overgrown path they had followed from the car. "You just don't want to walk back, do you?" he questioned. She opened her mouth to argue, but he anticipated her. "Don't lie to me, Scully. Not that you can."

"I can do whatever I want," she objected.

"Not in this case. I'm going to head back; you can stay here if you want. We'll stop back by here on our way to arrest Wright to pick you up." He turned and started off the way they had come. With another exhalation of exasperation, Scully turned and followed him. He heard the crunch of leaves beneath her shoes behind him and smiled to himself; he had known full well that she would inevitably come with him.

When they reached the edge of the trees, Mulder stopped suddenly. Scully started to move forward without him, but he held out an arm to stop her. She turned to him in confusion and noticed that his eyes were focused intently on the black SUV that he had used to drive them to the scene. Following his gaze, she found that all four tires on the SUV had been punctured. Scully heard the click of a safety beside her and glanced over to see that Mulder had drawn his gun. She quickly followed his example, raising the gun in front of her. "Seems our presence was noticed," Mulder remarked. "And unwanted." Scully said nothing; instead, she emerged carefully from the woods, sweeping the area to her right with the gun. Mulder did the same for the left side. A slight rustling caused both to turn forward again, focusing their attention on a small shrub directly in front of them. Cautiously, they began to approach, but before they reached it, a small brown rabbit hopped out from beneath the foliage.

"What do you think? It could be our killer," Mulder quipped. Scully glared at him, her eyes clearly telling him that it was no time for jokes. With a small shrug and a slight upturning of the corners of his mouth, he nodded toward his left. Scully also nodded in acknowledgement of his choice, and the two split up, Scully heading toward her right and Mulder toward his left. As she walked further from the car, Scully became acutely aware of the sounds around her. Each crackle of leaves under her feet, each chirp by one of the local birds suddenly sounded as loud as a supersonic jet taking off. Her body was tense, her muscles coiled tightly like a spring compressed as far as it would go. She knew she had been trained for this situation and could likely handle any problems which arose, but something about the area seemed unnerving. The air had an ominous quality which she could not quite place but which left her feeling frightened and unprepared despite her extensive training.

She did not hear the sounds of his approach until it was too late. By the time she heard the telltale crackle of the ubiquitous leaves beneath his feet, he had already come close enough to touch her. She tried to spin around, but he had already grabbed her shoulder with one strong, calloused hand. She felt a small pinch in her neck accompanied by a slight chill beneath her skin which rapidly spread to the rest of her body. Her vision blurred; she blinked rapidly to clear it, but the world continued to spin around her, rapidly losing focus. Vaguely, she realized she had been drugged, but this thought had barely crossed her mind before her brain shut down completely, plunging her into blackness.

Mulder was feeling the same apprehension as Scully. He sensed that someone was near, and he also sensed that this someone was somehow involved in the murders. After all, people did not typically slash tires without a reason. And he and Scully had not been in the town long enough to piss anyone off enough to warrant the slashing of their tires. Someone did not want them to leave. And Mulder had a sneaking suspicion he knew exactly who that person was.

A sound to his right caused him to swing around quickly, letting his gun sweep the area in front of him. He saw nothing to alert his suspicions, and he chided himself for being so jumpy. He had a gun and extensive training in hand-to-hand combat courtesy of the FBI. He could take care of himself.

As he continued to sweep the area with his gun, he felt rather than heard a presence behind him. Before he could do anything, something pricked his neck, and his world went black.


	7. Chapter 7

When Scully opened her eyes, she immediately noticed that she was not in a bed. Of course, this was not a completely unusual occurrence; since the babies were born, she had become accustomed to falling asleep in a variety of places around the house from the rocking chair in the nursery to the swing on their back porch. But one thing she was unaccustomed to was the stench of decay which flooded the air around her. She had smelled it a few times in her life, but only at crime scenes where the victim had been dead for a number of days. It was by no means a pleasant smell.

Though Scully's head still pounded, she managed to push herself into a sitting position, this action made more difficult by the rough rope which encircled her wrists, tied so tightly that she guessed it would have a serious effect on the circulation of blood to her hands. She tested the knots for a moment, pulling her wrists apart and trying to wriggle her hands out of the loop, but all she succeeded in doing was rubbing the skin off her hands. After a couple minutes of fruitless struggling, she gave up, deciding instead to survey her surroundings. She was in a barn or storage shed of some kind she guessed though there was nothing around her to give a clue of the use of the building. A small sliver of light had fought its way through the crack between two boards across the room which covered what Scully guessed once was a window. A couple feet away from the boarded up window was a large wooden door made from the same rotting wood which seemed to make up the rest of the barn.

A groan beside her told Scully that she was not alone. She turned quickly, relaxing visibly when she realized that her partner lay beside her. Mulder's hair was even more unruly than usual, matted to his head with sweat and, upon closer inspection, a small amount of blood. Scully frowned at this revelation. Head wounds, even ones that did not seem too serious, were never good. He opened his eyes groggily, and they immediately turned to focus on Scully. "Am I in heaven?" he queried, the slight rise in his eyebrows and his light tone clearly indicating that he was joking.

"Do you really think heaven would look like this?" Scully waved a hand at their dismal surroundings.

"Well, it can't be hell, because you're hear with me," Mulder remarked with a slight grin. Squeezing his eyes shut, he brought his fingers to his head, feeling around for a moment before flinching as he discovered the source of the blood.

"Are you okay, Mulder?" Scully questioned, starting toward him.

"It's just a flesh wound," he quoted, his familiar grin firmly in place again. Taking his hands from his head, he reached beside him and pushed himself into a sitting position, wincing slightly. "Guess I hit something on the way down. Whatever he injected us with works fast."

"He's good at staying hidden. I didn't hear him until he was right behind me, and by that time, he had already drugged me."

Mulder started to nod but quickly reconsidered this action when his head throbbed. "I didn't even hear him. He knows how to move through these woods."

"Someone familiar with the woods. Wright is becoming a better and better suspect."

"Yeah. Too bad we can't do anything about it right now." Mulder pulled at his bonds for a couple minutes before deciding, as Scully already had, that the rope was too tight to escape from. With a sigh of frustration, he let his hands fall beside him. Suddenly, he perked up as he remembered something. "I've got a knife in the front pocket of my jeans," he told Scully. "If we're lucky, he didn't think to search us."

"Can you get to it?" she questioned.

"Yeah. Just give me a second." He grunted as he maneuvered his hands so that they were hovering above his right front pocket. It was difficult to reach into his pocket with his hands tied together, but he managed to insert the fingers of one hand between the two layers of fabric. Stretching his fingers as far as he could, he felt the cool metal of the pocket knife, and his smile widened. By pulling his other hand back slightly, he managed to push his fingers into his pocket a couple more inches. By this time, his hands were far enough apart that the rope was rubbing badly, and Mulder knew he would have some impressive blisters later. At the moment, however, he did not care about future injuries. He only wanted to get both himself and Scully out of the desolate building alive.

Ignoring the pain in his wrists, he spread his fingers slightly and managed to capture the knife between his index finger and middle finger. Slowly, he began to extract it from his pocket, but it slipped from his grasp before he could pull it out fully. "Dammit!" he cursed as the knife slid back to the bottom of his pocket.

"Do you need help?"

"No, I've got it." Gritting his teeth, Mulder pushed his hand in again, this time making sure to grip the knife more firmly before beginning the excruciatingly slow movement. After a few seconds, the knife had traveled far enough for him to capture it between his thumb and index finger, and it was relatively easy to pull out after that point. As it slid from his pocket, it fell to the dirt floor, and Mulder picked it up again, gripping it more firmly. With a flick of his wrist, he flicked it open and motioned Scully over. She crawled the few feet to crouch in front of him, holding her bound hands out so that he could saw the rope between them.

As the first strand broke, they heard the unmistakable sound of a key in a lock. Mulder froze for a moment before quickly backing away from Scully, flipping the knife closed and sitting on it to keep it hidden. He thought about replacing it in his pocket but quickly dismissed the idea. There was just as much chance that their abductor would find it in his pocket, and now he had easy access to it.

The door opened fully, admitting a small amount of light from the moon and stars. A man walked in, his features slightly shadowy. "I knew it," Mulder muttered.

"Awake, I see," the man, who Mulder had easily identified Wright, commented. "Good, that will make this go much better. She always prefers them awake."

"Who prefers them awake?" Scully questioned as Wright approached the partners. She hoped that if she could distract him for long enough, they would have a better chance of escaping from the storage shed alive.

"My beloved," Wright answered simply. "She says that it's more exciting, that it gives her more fulfillment. And I'm happy to provide that." Scully looked over at Mulder, wondering if he had understood the man any better than she had. Unfortunately, he was not looking her way; all his attention was focused on the older man standing in front of them. His eyes glinted with understanding.

"She feeds on love, doesn't she?" he questioned.

"It's all she wants. She doesn't need food. Never has." Wright's voice had a note of admiration in it. "I met her a few years back. She had been living on the streets, finding bits and pieces of it where she could. But she never found much, and she was half-starved when I came across her. It was love at first sight. She was beautiful and smart and everything you could ever want in a woman, and I loved her completely. Since I gave my love willingly, she never had to take it forcibly, so I was allowed to keep my physical heart though she always had my heart in so many other ways." His eyes had taken on a glossy quality as he spoke. Scully looked to Mulder, still confused, but Mulder still had all his attention focused on Wright, fascinated by his words. "At first, my love was enough. It kept her going. She got gradually stronger. But there came a point where I just couldn't provide everything she needed anymore. As much as I loved her, the love of one person just wasn't enough."

"That's when you started killing."

"Of course. I couldn't just let my darling starve. If she needed love, then I would provide love. It was easier than I thought. There were plenty of couples in love around, and they always made a show of themselves, so it was not hard to find them. Once I discovered a suitable couple, I would follow them and wait until their guard was down. It was a simple matter to drug them and carry them back here after that. No one ever comes through these woods anyway."

"So you brought them back here and then what?" Mulder queried.

"You'll find out soon enough," Wright remarked with a smile that sent a shiver down Scully's spine. He was crazy; she had determined that much after a few seconds of speaking with him. And she had learned over the years that the crazy ones were often also the most dangerous.

"She kills them, right?" Mulder prodded.

"She doesn't mean to!" Wright defended quickly. "She needs love, just like you or I need food. Those people simply weren't willing to give it to her. So she had to take it from them. If you were starving, wouldn't you do anything you could to make sure you go the food you needed? Or better yet, if the lovely Agent Scully over there was starving, wouldn't you do whatever you could to make sure she got the nourishment she needed?" Mulder was silent, and Wright let a slow smile spread across his face. "I thought so. When you showed up at my house the other day, my beloved mentioned that you would make a perfect candidate. It was a simple matter to find you in town, and as soon as I saw the lovely Agent Scully, I immediately knew who had your love. You two try not to make it obvious; you certainly weren't as showy as the rest of them. I guess that has something to do with your jobs; I know the FBI frowns on people who work together being involved in a relationship. But I guess there's not many other options; you can't control who you love. But I must warn you that your love is very apparent to everyone. I'm surprised your superiors haven't said anything yet. I took one look at you and knew."

"So you're going to kill us?" Scully inquired.

"I'm not going to do anything," Wright told her. "But you two are going to wait here until she comes. That shouldn't be too much longer; I hear her now."

Straining her ears, Scully could hear what had alerted the older man; there was a shuffling sound outside, almost like someone slowly walking toward the shed, dragging his or her feet along the ground. Scully glanced over at Mulder who had begun to steadily work the knife out from underneath him, keeping his eyes locked on the man in front of him. Luckily, Wright seemed preoccupied with the approach of his "darling." After a few contortions, Mulder managed to extract the knife and open it behind his back. Subtly, Scully moved closer to him, ensuring that her back was directly in front of the knife. Wright glanced over at them, and for a moment, Scully was sure that they had been caught. But Wright simply smiled, remarking, "Partners, my ass. I can't believe the FBI buys that line."

"The bigwigs tend to ignore us as much as possible," Mulder informed Wright, turning slightly, careful to keep the knife away from Scully's skin. He felt it come in contact with the rope and silently began to saw. The rope was thick, but it was fairly old, and it did not take long to cut through the rest of the worn strands. As the last one popped, Scully pulled her wrists apart slightly, ensuring that the bonds were truly gone. Once she realized that Mulder had indeed cut through all of the rope, she reached out and took the knife from his hands, making quick work of his bonds. Gratefully, Mulder clenched and unclenched his fingers behind his back a couple times in an attempt to start the blood flowing through them again. Once satisfied that his hands were fully functional again, he took the knife from Scully and looked back to Wright. All of Wright's attention was now focused on the door to the barn; with a start, Mulder realized that it was opening slowly.

A single glance at Scully told him that she was ready. Her body was tensed, her hands clenched into fists behind her back. His eyes met hers, and a slight nod told her when to move. Together, they sprang into action, Mulder moving toward the hand with the gun, his knife now out in front of him. Scully moved to the man's other side, ducking low to take out his feet. Seeing their movement, Wright turned around, but the agents were on him before he could aim his gun. Mulder's initial intent had been to simply wrestle the gun from Wright; he did not want the knife to come into play. Unfortunately, Mulder's momentum propelled him forward, and he was unable to stop the weapon from plunging into Wright's bicep. The gun went off, and Mulder heard the thud of the bullet in the wall behind him.

By this time, all three were locked together; Scully had a strong grip around Wright's legs, slowly forcing him to the floor, and Mulder was grappling with him for the gun. Though Wright was bleeding profusely from the wound, his grip was still strong, and Mulder simply could not pull his fingers from the shotgun. It went off again, this time implanting a bullet in the ceiling. Mulder felt a rain of dust on his head, and he realized that it was a wonder the entire roof did not collapse considering the dismal state of the barn. "Mulder, what the hell are you doing?" Scully ground out, her arms growing tired from holding Wright's legs as he struggled. She had gripped him around the knees, but he had realized quickly that if he kicked out strong enough, it made it virtually impossible for her to hang on.

"I'm trying to get the gun," he said, bending backwards somewhat as Wright's fist came swinging around his body. With one hand off the gun, Wright's grip was weakened considerably, and one strong tug wrenched the gun from Wright's grip. Quickly, Mulder turned the gun around, pointing it directly at Wright's head. Breathing heavily, Scully let go of Wright's legs, standing to join Mulder.

"The gig's up, Wright," Mulder told him. "We've got you."

He leered at the two agents. "You've got nothing. She's still coming, and she doesn't need me here to enjoy a meal." Just as he said this, the door swung fully open, revealing a vaguely human figure. Whoever stood in the dim shadows in the doorway stood hunched over, wearing clothes which seemed much too big so that she simply appeared to have random pieces of fabric draped across her body. She shuffled further into the room, her feet continuing to make the sounds which had alerted the agents to her presence in the first place. Both agents turned, their breathing still labored. Mulder held the gun in front of him, pointed now at the misshapen figure which had entered the doorway, and Scully held the knife loosely in front of her body. Behind them, they heard a low scratching sound like someone rubbing two pieces of sandpaper together. "See, I told you," Wright said between hi throaty chuckles, "she's still going to come, and she's still going to kill you. You've accomplished nothing."

"Shut up," Mulder said, nudging him with the barrel of the gun. He fell silent, still wearing a wide grin which revealed two missing teeth.

"Yes, I can feel it," another low voice remarked. The syllables were drawn out, making the statement sound more like a hiss than something spoken in a human voice. "It's strong. Very strong. Yes."

"Stop right there," Scully said, gripping the knife more firmly and holding it out in front of her body threateningly. "We're federal agents."

"Stronger than any I've felt yet," the figure continued, obviously unperturbed by Scully's threat. She continued to advance forward, now coming within twenty feet of the two agents who both backed up subconsciously. Mulder lifted the gun slightly, firing off a shot above the figure's head. Her only reaction was to raise her head, revealing her face for the first time. The first thing Mulder noticed was that she was quite beautiful with smooth, rounded features, high cheekbones, and penetrating blue eyes. There was something different about those eyes, something that Mulder could not place, but he continued to stare at them for a few minutes, trying to discern what was so unique about those eyes.

"Mulder!" Scully called, abruptly breaking Mulder out of whatever temporary trance he had gone under. He shook his head firmly to clear the image of the eyes from it.

"I'm warning you, don't take another step forward," he called out to the figure. As he had expected, it made no response, so he aimed carefully and fired a second shot, this one directly at the shoulder area. This time, the woman did react, emitting an inhuman shriek as she gripped her arm tightly. Even in the dim lighting, Mulder could see the glistening crimson liquid which spilled out between her fingers. He relaxed slightly, assuming that she would stop now that she was hit. Beside him, Scully let the hand holding the knife fall to her side.

Suddenly, the woman started moving again, this time much faster than she had been initially. She came at the two agents so quickly that it appeared to Mulder for a moment that she was flying. Without thinking, he raised the gun and fired three shots, hearing another cry from the woman. When she was within a few feet of them, he let the gun drop to the floor, bringing his free hands to his face to shield himself as much as possible from whatever was coming. Beside him, Scully raised her knife again, steeling herself for the attack.

But the attack never came. The woman collapsed to the ground a few feet from the agents, blood now pooling from a wound in her chest. Cautiously, Mulder stepped toward her, bending over to check her pulse. As he extended his hand toward her neck, he suddenly heard a loud lament from behind him. "Nooooo!" Wright screamed, throwing himself at Mulder. Unprepared for the sudden onslaught, Mulder pitched forward underneath the man's weight, and Wright's hands immediately found his neck as his long fingers wrapped around Mulder's windpipe. Mulder's left hand reached for the gun which was unfortunately more than a foot away from his groping fingers. Instead, he raised his hands to grab Wright's arms, trying to wrestle the muscular man from his body.

The pressure released suddenly, and Mulder felt Wright's entire weight drop to his chest, forcing the breath abruptly out of his body. Looking up, Mulder saw Scully standing above him, holding the knife which was now coated in blood. She was staring at Wright with an expression of sadness and regret. Mulder knew that she hated to take a life; unfortunately, it was part of their job sometimes, and they simply had to deal with it as best as they could. He was simply happy that he did not have to face it alone.

Pushing Wright's lifeless body to the side, Mulder struggled out from underneath the heavy man, pushing himself to his feet. Immediately, he walked to Scully's side, engulfing her in his arms. It was what they both needed at the time—a chance to hold onto one another, to assure each other that they were both alive and breathing. It was their way of holding onto their humanity even when the circumstances threatened to strip it from them. And so they stood in the middle of the dusty, dilapidated storage shed silently holding one another, completely ignoring the two dead bodies at their feet.

After a minute or so, Scully remarked, "We should probably call the chief sometime soon to tell him we solved the case."

"Probably," Mulder agreed without letting go of her.

"That was close," Scully remarked after a few seconds. Mulder was not pulling away, and she felt no strong inclination to do so either.

"We've had close before."

"That was too close," Scully added.

"Definitely."

"We really need to stop putting ourselves in so much danger."

"Hazard of the job."

"I love you."

"I love you, too. More than you can ever imagine."

Two hours later, they both sat outside the forest, allowing the EMT's to check them over as the police searched the cabin and the storage shed. As soon as they had called the police, they had called a frantic Maggie to assure her that they were relatively unscathed. Scully had a few minor cuts on her wrist from the knife, and they both had abrasions from where the rope had rubbed into their skin. Still, their injuries did not consist of anything serious, and the EMT's finished with them in no time. Once cleared, both agents joined Wilkins who was standing by the treeline supervising the removal of the bodies.

"That was fine work, agents," Wilkins complemented. "I'm surprised I didn't see the connection before."

"Hindsight's twenty-twenty," Mulder remarked. "Besides, sometimes all it takes is a fresh set of eyes."

"Well, we were lucky to have them. Wright is our guy, no doubt about it. We found a collection of wedding bands along with other trinkets belonging to our victims in the bedroom. Seems he or the woman likes to keep mementos. Case closed."

"Actually, if you don't mind, I'd like to have the woman's body sent to Quantico so that Agent Scully can do an autopsy for her," Mulder said.

"Sure. Whatever you need. I'll just inform the coroner." As Wilkins walked over to speak to a heavyset, balding man in his early fifties, Scully turned to Mulder with her eyebrows high on her forehead.

"Autopsy, Mulder? When did I agree to that?"

"Come on, Scully, please! I just want to see if there's anything unusual about her. I mean, it's not every day that you run into someone who can take a person's heart out without cutting into their body at all."

"We still don't know that she never cut into the body. I haven't completely ruled out the possibility that they simply performed some novel form of noninvasive surgery."

"We found no surgical implements of any kind in the house or the shed," Mulder pointed out, swinging his arm back and forth as he held his shoulder. It had hurt like hell since Wright tackled him to the floor. The EMT's and Scully had both assured him that he did not dislocate it, promising him that it was likely nothing more serious than a bruise. Their assurances did not keep him from complaining bitterly about it, however.

"Maybe they hid them somewhere. Or maybe they have another hideout somewhere where they actually perform the surgery."

"Another hideout more hidden than this one? I don't think so. Besides, I'm not sure if two people could perform such a complicated procedure so flawlessly."

"I refuse to believe that that woman could actually remove a person's heart without any form of surgery."

"Fine. You write what you want in your report, and I'll write what I want in mine."

"Isn't that what we always do?"

"Why change a good thing?"

"Why indeed." Scully smiled at him as he put his arm around her shoulders, leading her to their car. Behind them, the police were finishing loading the evidence and all their equipment in their vehicles. All in all, it was a satisfactory ending to a case. For once, they had actually caught the killer. They were not chasing after ghosts or shadows or some such nonsense; they had a concrete person on which to blame the crimes. Scully hoped the upper-level brass would be happy with their success—possibly happy enough to let them be for awhile. She found it much easier to work when her superiors were not breathing down her neck about expense reports or unfinished paperwork. And now that the case was over, they could possibly take half a day off to just relax at home with the girls. That would certainly be nice.

A smile crept across Scully's lips as she considered the possibilities. For once in her life, the pieces seemed to be fitting together, and she couldn't be happier.


End file.
